Regenerative pump or turbine with stationary axle and rotating housing

Abstract

This invention is about a set of common features that will characterize any machine of the new type to be produced within the set of pumps, turbines and blowers. The machines in this new category, as will be here described, will be told apart from those already in use by one main peculiarity. They will feature a stationary (non-rotating) axle for the rotation of the impeller around it but the impeller will be a solid part of the housing which will be the rotating part. Firmly, on or through the hollow core of the axle, ducts will be fitted for the intake and discharge of the powering or pumped fluid. So the housing of the machine will deliver or receive power from the body in which it will be incorporated or connected (that is torque times angular velocity). An implementation of this invention is shown in the accompanying drawings. Here the rim of a wheel of an aircraft is the rotating body. Part of the rim will serve as the housing (containing shell) of an air-driven turbine (or pump as the case may be). Accordingly, the normal stationary hub of the (formerly idle) wheel will serve as the axle of rotation for the impeller born by the rotating housing. This turbine within the rim will be powered by compressed air from the fuselage to make torque for prespinning the wheel just before touchdown. During landing, this air may be redirected to the brakes for early cooling. The rim already transformed into an air-driven turbine can be utilized to taxi or pull-out the aircraft without a tractor. In this case the turbine of this invention can be made as a two-stage regenerative machine. Research on the capabilities of the just invented turbine at the phase of development will determine the feasibility of taxiing without the main engines at least partially, using pneumatic power from the Auxiliary Power Unit.

1 . According to this invention a new subset of machines is produced that can be classified as pumps, turbines and blowers in the well-known set of regenerative aka side-channel machines. The overall difference that will tell apart the members of this subset from the machines that are made by the up-to-date art is an innovative design as follows. It materializes a mutual change (swap) of rotational for stationary members (parts) of these machines. That is, the impeller will rotate together with the housing while the axis for the rotation will be a stationary (non-rotating) axle. Products by the new design will be best fit for out-of-the-way uses as the one stated in the second claim. An analysis of this difference in the design of a side-channel aka regenerative machine of the new type as compared to the usual one is given below. It consists of the following items.
 1.1 The housing is constructed as a perfectly self-symmetrical object in reference to the axis of rotation, which is the centerline of a materialized stationary (non-rotating) axle.   1.2 The new impeller (in the function of the sun-like old one) will be a twin formation of radially arranged plane blades (vanes) incorporated at the inner faces of the housing, mirroring each other on a plane of symmetry normal to the axle.   1.3 The position of the blades (vanes) in one half-impeller is now made offset by half a pitch that is half the angle between two consecutive blades. By this re-arrangement the plane of each blade bisects the space between two blades of the opposite half-impeller. This feature will induce a snakelike movement to the powering fluid combined with the vortices that make the device work as a regenerative one.   1.4 The place of each of the former side-channels is now occupied by a half-impeller. That is why a new position is reserved for the current substitute of the deleted side-channels in the vacant 3d-shape which used to be swept by the blades of the former impeller. This shape now contains the unique “inner channel” in the function of the two typical side-channels of a usual regenerative machine. This “inner channel” has been termed a “working channel” in the pertinent description.   1.5 The vacant place of the bearing disc of the ex-impeller is now filled by a stationary (non-rotating) hollow body, approximately a shallow drum. This forms an extension of the stationary axle to which it is attached concentrically by a profiled hollow core.   1.6 The cylindrical outmost surface of the drum borders the “working channel”. This is the vacant space which used to be swept by the vanes of the previous impeller. Its centerline is an arc of about 160 degrees. The rest of it on the full circle is filled by a shape that extends out of the drum into the entire cross-section of the working channel. This shape contains two back-to-back orifices that stand at the starting and the ending points of the working channel.   1.7 The stationary drum is divided into compartments that provide two separate paths for the powering fluid to move in and out of the working channel. The paths continue through a cavity along the centerline of the axle or pass closely by the axle through a body concentric to it so as not to interfere with the rotating housing.   
     
     
         2 . In any of the wheels that bear the weight of an aircraft on the ground the rim is utilized so as to incorporate the housing of an air-driven turbine capable of working also as a blower of the type described in  claim 1 . Compressed air from the Auxiliary Power Unit is led into the turbine to produce a torque for pre-spinning the wheel just prior to touchdown. Immediately next, a flow originating from the turbine will be inserted to the braking system for cooling. By producing torque this way with pneumatic means within the wheels, taxiing will be assigned to the self-powered wheels without help from the main engines. Autonomy will also be provided for pushback based on the symmetrical properties of the turbine as described in  claim 1 . The substitution of the main engines on the ground by this pneumatic system will provide, apart from economical also environmental benefits for aviation.